Hardcore/Elitist community disappears - What happens to WoW?

As the title inquires...

For whatever reason, the so called "Hardcore" or "Elitist" crowd disappears from WoW. The competitive scene is gone too. PVP and endgame raiding still exist, sure, but the people who were doing this stuff at the highest levels now no longer play.

The probability of such a thing happening is irrelevant for my purposes.

What happens to WoW with all the best and most dedicated players of both PVE and PVP persuasions gone?

Here's my thoughts, and you tell me yours and if you agree with mine.

These so called "Hardcore" players, or "Elitists" whoever they may be, however you define or quantify them, are one of the most important facets in WoW. Without them, what's the point of having hardmode raids, or making content difficult? Why have a competitive scene for PVP if there's no truly outstanding players to watch, sponsor, or feature in competitions and at events?

Even if by the numbers these players make up a small percent, which, according to Blizzard they apparently think that they do only make up a small percent... even if they only make up a small percent of the playerbase, they're easily the most important part of the community. Why? Because it's what separates WoW from countless other MMOs, gives notoriety, inspires the community to do better and do more than just grind dailies, etc.

Not every hardcore or elitist player is in a top 100 guild or is out there clearing hardmodes on week 2. There's hardcore players at almost every level of gameplay, but what separates them from other players is that they're always doing research, knowing how to play their class, knowing the fights on day1 when new content drops be it 5mans or raids, and always pushing to upgrade their gear and performance as much as they can. Even if they're not the greatest players ever, the fact that they care and strive for constant improvement usually puts them significantly above the average player in terms of knowledgeability, competence, execution, and performance.

So what happens if they all disappear? No one is explaining shitall to new players in 5mans, or LFR. No one is carrying the group anymore in 5mans or LFR. No one is working to organize guilds, raids, or groups of players for PUG content, and if they are, they're doing so poorly, and trying to organize players in shoddy gear who don't know the fights, the mechanics, or their classes.

No one is posting videos of correct execution of mechanics for fights anymore. No one is writing guides or class tips that are actually factual, helpful, or available when they're needed most (while the content is new). Addons? Half of the most important ones probably disappear and go completely broken a few patches out. Who are they being developed by if not the most passionate and dedicated of players?

And for anyone wondering what the fuck the point of all this is, for me, it's that Blizzard basically made MoP a giant "Fuck You" to the "small percentage" of hardcore/elitist players, despite the value they add to the WoW community as a whole, by gating content behind dailies and by making the entire gearing process a massive rep-grind, and then turning around and verbally slapping them in the face with their ridiculous replies to shit on the forums about how "you don't have to do dailies" -- Look, fuck you pal, if it's the best progression path available to someone who's hellbent on the best gear as fast as possible, you better bet your ass they'll be doing that shit no matter how much they fucking hate it. Galleon? You better bet it's a huge issue to people on servers with large raider population disparities.

And I just don't think they "get" it when they say that it's only a "small percentage" of people who grind out every daily every day in the name of progression... that doesn't change the fact that they made the best progression path available an incredibly tedious and not remotely fun experience, all while taking away everyone's ability to do it through alternative means. Cata was nice. Get to friendly, put on tabard, run dungeons. Now? It takes me 10 times longer to grind VP via dungeon, and I have to grind out an infinite amount of tedious, boring, uncompelling, grindy, substanceless dailies to get gear for any toon. And apparently this is an upgrade?

Everything that's not raiding is a means to an end. Blizzard just made my means to an end take a million times longer, and suck a million times worse, and they expect me to be content with "Well, they're optional, you can do a little at a time" -- If I'm not raiding and gearing up as fast as possible to do progression content as efficiently as possible, I might as well not be playing. So I'm not quitting, but I'm certainly the fuck not happy about all this nonsense. And that's where the question came in: What would happen to this game if the entire community of "hardcore" or "elitist" players disappeared?

You're incorrect. You don't need to do the sort of dailies you are referring to in order to push raiding. If you're in a serious raiding guild, you would be decked out with normal mode gear within a week or two, and you would fill gaps with the one faction that you need. Capping valor is also not an issue if you're a hardcore player.

Tier 14 is one of the best raiding tiers since ICC for hardcores. It's been a long time since we've had 16 bosses to kill in 1 tier before. Compared to Firelands (7) and Dragon Soul (8), T14 trumps them all by a huge margin. Now, raiding isn't just show up on Tuesday, clear 8 bosses in 1 night, wait till next Tuesday for reset.

It's a breath of fresh air that Blizzard is finally making larger tiers with harder bosses that have more complex mechanics. 16 bosses per tier should be the usual, not 7 or 8 like Blizzard got away with in T12 and T13.

You're incorrect. You don't need to do the sort of dailies you are referring to in order to push raiding. If you're in a serious raiding guild, you would be decked out with normal mode gear within a week or two, and you would fill gaps with the one faction that you need. Capping valor is also not an issue if you're a hardcore player.

There's like 16 gear slots in WoW. MSV has 6 bosses. Each boss drops 2 items. That's a maximum of 12 items in the first week. Say you clear it again, then that's 24 items. It's impossible to have every single piece of gear from normal mode by week 2, because that would mean that every single piece for every slot you needed, dropped AND it means that you had no competition for the rolls and got every single piece. The chances of that happening are insanely low. Now, there's the Elder Coins, but by week two you would have 6. If we're being optimistic, then that brings the number of gear slots needed from 16 to 10. Now that's being VERY VERY optimistic, but still. 10 slots. 24 items, and you have to get 10 unique items from the bosses. This means no duplicates from the coins or from the regular drops.

So, if you are in a top guild and you want to get world/realm/region first, then you're going to need everything you can get, so you HAVE to run LFR and you HAVE to do dailies. Not to mention that some of the rep items might be better than what you can get in normal MSV. Come on. Think before you speak, because you're just making yourself look stupid.

What this topic fails to realise is that the hardcore/elite grew up, got jobs and families and can no longer spend the time playing wow like they use to. Those who did not burned out on the game because they were hardcore and spent so much time in the game that naturally the game became played out.

Now I return you to the daily hate message of how Blizz ruined the game for us and hardcores quitting in droves is proof of it.

Well, one thing that will be seen immediately is the barn animals would be gone.

Having them everywhere on tables and counters crapping all over, ever demanding to eat everything up worse than a space goat on steroids...HAIL MARY! THEY'RE GONE!!!

Now the rest of WoW can just have fun playing, without the dweebs shouting how good they are at ganking level 50s as level 90s; or level 90s bragging about their purples they got after the 3rd nerf in a roll and using 3 overgeared healers to carry them along.

!! BYE, GOOD RIDDANCE. DON'T LOOK BACK !!

From the #1 Cata review on Amazon.com: "Blizzard's greatest misstep was blaming players instead of admitting their mistakes. They've convinced half of the population that the other half are unskilled whiners, causing a permanent rift in the community."

Blizzard's blame game in action:Deleting 6,100+ of Kevyne's posts and threads from the WoW forums.

This is a good question, and something I have been seeing slowly happen to the game in recent years. The voice of the hardcore, long-term player is being drowned out by the repeated demands of the casual player and changes to the game reflect this.

But this is a trend that is affecting not only WoW, but the entire MMO genre. MMORPGs were, in my opinion, always aimed at the hardcore/elitist demographic. But with the rest of the genre seeing Blizzard's success at taking a more casual approach and setting milestones in the process, they feel the need to follow suit.

Needless to say, if the hardcore/elitist community disappeared, we would have a very different game on our hands. Whether or not it would be a good thing, remains to be unseen. But what I say is this: What happens to any game when the drive to be competitive diminishes?

For whatever reason, the so called "Hardcore" or "Elitist" crowd disappears from WoW.

Barging in right here. Where is your proof? "a giant "Fuck You" to the "small percentage" of hardcore/elitist players,.....by gating content behind dailies"?

No..the true hardcore and elitist could clear all hardmodes without needing rep or valor gear at first. HMs were cleared by Paragon, For the Horde, Vodka and whatnot in a mix of 5 man heroic and normal raidgear. They didn't even have time to grind all reps to revered and in the two weeks before the last HM boss fell they could barely have accumulated 2000 VP - which translates to one measly VP item per raider.

Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment

... there are lots of different types of players, with different amounts of time to play, and different tastes for the content and difficulty and time commitment they want to give to any of those pieces of content. The person that plays for an hour or so a few times a week is playing the same game as the person that plays five hours every night.....

I understand that people believe this. They have a right to their opinion but I think it's factually wrong. There are all sorts of things in this particular game that have nothing whatsoever to do with raiding.

On the flip side, viewing everything in the game as an adjunct and enabler of progression raiding leads to the belief that X or Y or Z is something that people are forced to do when they are more properly viewed as multiple pathways to an end.

So with that, I pretty much disagree with your premises.

What would happen to this game if the entire community of 'hardcore' or 'elitist' players disappeared? They would soon be replaced by others who, rightly or not, would think of themselves in the same way. The truly hardcore, for the most part, don't make long forum posts complaining about the work they have to do to be hardcore. They embrace the things they need to do to be the best in the game. They may view some of it as more workmanlike than fun but being truly hardcore is a commitment and a lifestyle more than anything else. They do because they must.

Last edited by MoanaLisa; 2012-11-06 at 05:13 PM.

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Sturgeon's Law states that 90% of everything is crap. When posting try and be in the 10% once in a while. It makes it better for everyone.

There's like 16 gear slots in WoW. MSV has 6 bosses. Each boss drops 2 items. That's a maximum of 12 items in the first week. Say you clear it again, then that's 24 items. It's impossible to have every single piece of gear from normal mode by week 2, because that would mean that every single piece for every slot you needed, dropped AND it means that you had no competition for the rolls and got every single piece. The chances of that happening are insanely low. Now, there's the Elder Coins, but by week two you would have 6. If we're being optimistic, then that brings the number of gear slots needed from 16 to 10. Now that's being VERY VERY optimistic, but still. 10 slots. 24 items, and you have to get 10 unique items from the bosses. This means no duplicates from the coins or from the regular drops.

So, if you are in a top guild and you want to get world/realm/region first, then you're going to need everything you can get, so you HAVE to run LFR and you HAVE to do dailies. Not to mention that some of the rep items might be better than what you can get in normal MSV. Come on. Think before you speak, because you're just making yourself look stupid.

NO, NO aaaand NO! What you describe is NOT a top guild. It is a very average guild. Any top guild worth the title "TOP" guild has now cleared 6/6 HM. If you have not...you are no Top guild. You ... just....are....NOT

Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment

... there are lots of different types of players, with different amounts of time to play, and different tastes for the content and difficulty and time commitment they want to give to any of those pieces of content. The person that plays for an hour or so a few times a week is playing the same game as the person that plays five hours every night.....

Blizzard will shut down the WoW servers well before the hardcore left.

The hardcore are only hardcore because of their passion for the game and their desire for excellence. Once the game truly begins to offer nothing, the super casual will be the first to leave. Then over time more people will leave, with those that have put forth the most time and derive the most enjoyment out of the game leaving last.

So if the hardcore are the 1 or 2 percent, the servers would be shut down well before they leave as it would become unprofitable to maintain them after the loss of 60% of the current player base.

The probability of such a thing happening is irrelevant for my purposes.

What happens to WoW with all the best and most dedicated players of both PVE and PVP persuasions gone?

This has already occurred.

When Darrowmere changed from PvP to PvE and offered free transfers, EVERYONE at 80 left. End of WotLK and you couldn't find a single person in Dalaran at peak hours. Alliance or Horde.

What happened ? People started to have fun. All the people that had no clue about the PvP/PvE change, and couldnt tell you the difference if they did, stayed and kept playing. They weren't mocked on trade chat, etc, so they opened up and it became an interesting and closeknit community.

It sucks for the endgame experience, and even now there's not even a dozen guilds that have killed ANYTHING on the server, but it certainly wasn't a bad thing.

More often then not, its detrimental to the game and the community to keep players around that no longer enjoy the game, but fail to admit it to themselves out of habit & addiction.